Super Rugby: Niall Williams-Guthrie follows footsteps of brother Sonny Bill Williams in signing with Blues

Niall Williams-Guthrie has signed with the Blues for the 2024 Super Rugby Aupiki season. Photo / Photosport

Niall Williams-Guthrie has made a surprise switch in codes for 2024, following in the footsteps of her brother Sonny Bill Williams in moving from league to rugby.

Williams-Guthrie will join the Blues for the 2024 Super Rugby Aupiki season, after playing for the Gold Coast Titans in the NRLW competition this year. The competitions don’t overlap, so she has plans to relocate to the Gold Coast and turn out for the Titans again next season.

Announcing the move on Monday, Williams-Guthrie said while she was following the pathway of her brother, she hoped to achieve something he didn’t in a Blues jersey.

“He said stop copying me. I said ‘man, I’m not copying you – we’re going to win’,” Williams-Guthrie quipped.

“But he’s stoked for me. He knows what it’s like – you have a short career and it can be over at any point so whatever you can make of it, you make the most of it.”

It’s an interesting move from the Blues. While the 35-year-old has a decorated background with the Black Ferns Sevens, the 15-a-side game is new territory for her. She said her rugby background extends to about six games at club level in Tauranga where she was deployed as an openside flanker, but indicated the Blues are looking at her as an option for their midfield in 2024.

Assistant coach Carlos Spencer said while they were excited to have a player with so much experience in high-level competition, things were in the early stages in terms of on-field planning and they were yet to have meaningful discussions with her about the season ahead.

“Those discussions are yet to be made. We obviously want to do what’s best for her, so that’s just a matter of sitting down with Niall, having those discussions and really work with her and what suits her,” Spencer said.

“It’s just about, for us, having her on board, getting her to experience a bit of the 15s stuff and what that looks like. Coming off the NRL is a lot different to 15s and she’s got to get her head around that, but we’ll do our best to make sure to help her as much as we can.”

Williams-Guthrie was one of several Kiwi athletes competing in the NRLW in 2023 and believes more of the country’s top female athletes will look at the potential of splitting time between the two codes in the future.

Among those in the NRLW in 2023 were Tyla Nathan-Wong, who played for the Blues in 2022, and Cheyelle Robins-Reti, who won the competition with Matatū in 2023.

“I’ve had conversations with other athletes in New Zealand who said, ‘That’s really cool, I’d love to go have a stint in league and come back,’ and I think that’s the future, that’s where women’s athletes are heading now. It’s like the men’s game – you’re going to have sabbaticals, you’re going to have women who want to take up all these opportunities while still being in the top New Zealand rugby team.

“It’s all about embracing it rather than just pushing it to the side, to see what we can do and how we can make it work, because at the end of the day we want to keep our amazing female athletes here playing rugby, but we also want to let them go and explore things too. If that’s the way we’re going to have to do it to keep them here, then I’m all for it.”

Christopher Reive joined the Herald sports team in 2017, bringing the same versatility to his coverage as he does to his sports viewing habits.